You have a great family who loves and misses you

Elijah,

This is the time of year for us.  Remembering the day you died.  We seem to be right back to June 2, 2016 everytime.  There's no way around it.  We just have to go through it.  Not having you with us is so very, very hard.  You were such a beautiful person.  Are you still out there?  If God exists and you are, will he ever let you come to us?  If you have come to us and we're just the ones not seeing or feeling, what do we have to do to connect?  I wish someoen could know and show me the way.  Why do some people get to see those that have gone beyond?  Is that real?  I want that.  Instead, we all go to places that are sacred to us and spread your ashes.  Yesterday you became a part of the Mountainview Baseball Field at shortstop and home plate.  You know, in the whole time you played baseball, I never saw it from your vantage point.  It was beautiful. 

Your ashes are now in Capital Reef National Park.  Dad climbed a couple of places to spread them.  Ryan put your ashes with a 300 year old tree in Portland.  Michael, Keira, and Miles spread them at the studio where Michael recorded your cd.  Ben drove to Indianapolis to spread some by a tree at the Simon Cancer Center.  He finally saw where you fought a hard fight; where people tried so hard to save you.  The place that allowed us to have another year with you.

Josalyn Pierce sent me a quote I will try to live by Elijah. "I don't want your legacy to be that your death permanently broke me.  Your life, your love, and my love for you will sustain my survival."

I'm in a survival mode especially this weekend.  I know you'd want me to live, really live like you wanted to.  I just can't do that yet Elijah.  My heart hurts so very much still.  I'm sorry if I disappoint you but I'm a mother without her baby boy and that is so very hard.  I love you forever, I like you for always.  As long as I'm living my baby you'll be.

Love,
Mom

Was it yesterday or forever ago?

Two years today.  Two years of everyday sadness and living.  How does this happen?  Why don't I just break?  How is it even possible that I live, breathe, work, laugh sometimes, play, eat, vacation all while having a gaping hole in my heart.  I awaken to thoughts of missing you.  I go to sleep wondering if you are out there.  Do you see us?  Do you ever check in?  Or, are you just gone- only living in my aching heart?  I used to believe this fairy tale that life is eternal, that families are together forever, that we grow, we continue to learn, and we continue.  I have no evidence you are anywhere.  You've been absent for two years.  No visit to let me know you're ok.  No feeling of nearness.  Nothing but empty loneliness.  Church hurts.  It's a place where they speak of miraculous healings, of visitations of spirits gone from the earth.  I've experienced none of these things so it hurts to feel unworthy of them.  All I can do is breathe and keep going until I can't.  It all seems so totally impossible.

I look at the trees in full bloom.  I recognize that everyday the earth's fruits change.  Trees live a long time but sometimes Mother Earth sends disasters that cut their lives short.  Other trees take their place.  Why shouldn't it be so with people?  None of us are born to live forever.  I understand that.  What I now understand is that while living we have deep cuts that leave scars and like trees that drip maple syrup from holes cut in them, I will drip tears from the hole in my heart until my roots whither up and I leave this earth.